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The Language of the Night:Best Fantasy writers? (Open Thread) [1]

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Date: 2025-01-13

Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction which involves themes of the supernatural, magic, and imaginary worlds and creatures

Its roots are in oral traditions, which became fantasy literature and drama. From the twentieth century, it has expanded further into various media, including film, television, graphic novels, manga, animation, and video games.

The expression fantastic literature is also often used to refer to this genre by the Anglophone literary critics.[3][4][5][6] An archaic spelling for the term is phantasy.[7]

Fantasy is distinguished from the genres of science fiction and horror by the absence of scientific or macabre themes, although these can occur in fantasy. In popular culture, the fantasy genre predominantly features settings that emulate Earth, but with a sense of otherness.[8] In its broadest sense, however, fantasy consists of works by many writers, artists, filmmakers, and musicians from ancient myths and legends to many recent and popular works.

While some elements of the supernatural and the fantastic were a part of literature from its beginning, fantasy elements occur throughout ancient religious texts such as the Epic of Gilgamesh.[14] The ancient Babylonian creation epic, the Enûma Eliš, in which the god Marduk slays the goddess Tiamat,[15] contains the theme of a cosmic battle between good and evil, which is characteristic of the modern fantasy genre.[15] Genres of romantic and fantasy literature existed in ancient Egypt.[16] The Tales of the Court of King Khufu, which is preserved in the Westcar Papyrus and was probably written in the middle of the second half of the eighteenth century BC, preserves a mixture of stories with elements of historical fiction, fantasy, and satire.[17][18] Egyptian funerary texts preserve mythological tales,[16] the most significant of which are the myths of Osiris and his son Horus.[16]

Myth with fantastic elements intended for adults were a major genre of ancient Greek literature.[19] The comedies of Aristophanes are filled with fantastic elements,[20] particularly his play The Birds,[20] in which an Athenian man builds a city in the clouds with the birds and challenges Zeus's authority.[20] Ovid's Metamorphoses and Apuleius's The Golden Ass are both works that influenced the development of the fantasy genre[20] by taking mythic elements and weaving them into personal accounts.[20] Both works involve complex narratives in which humans beings are transformed into animals or inanimate objects.[20] Platonic teachings and early Christian theology are major influences on the modern fantasy genre.[20] Plato used allegories to convey many of his teachings,[20] and early Christian writers interpreted both the Old and New Testaments as employing parables to relay spiritual truths.[20] This ability to find meaning in a story that is not literally true became the foundation that allowed the modern fantasy genre to develop.[20]

The most well known fiction from the Islamic world is One Thousand and One Nights (Arabian Nights), which is a compilation of many ancient and medieval folk tales. Various characters from this epic have become cultural icons in Western culture, such as Aladdin, Sinbad and Ali Baba.[21] Hindu mythology was an evolution of the earlier Vedic mythology and had many more fantastical stories and characters, particularly in the Indian epics. The Panchatantra (Fables of Bidpai), for example, used various animal fables and magical tales to illustrate the central Indian principles of political science. Chinese traditions have been particularly influential in the vein of fantasy known as Chinoiserie, including such writers as Ernest Bramah and Barry Hughart.[21]

Beowulf is among the best known of the Old English tales in the English speaking world, and has had deep influence on the fantasy genre; several fantasy works have retold the tale, such as John Gardner's Grendel.[22] Norse mythology, as found in the Elder Edda and the Younger Edda, includes such figures as Odin and his fellow Aesir, and dwarves, elves, dragons, and giants.[23] These elements have been directly imported into various fantasy works. The separate folklore of Ireland, Wales, and Scotland has sometimes been used indiscriminately for "Celtic" fantasy, sometimes with great effect; other writers have specified the use of a single source.[24] The Welsh tradition has been particularly influential, due to its connection to King Arthur and its collection in a single work, the epic Mabinogion

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